Diversity

A friend recently wrote in her blog that being in a place "where people all around us speak a different language, live through a different worldview, and everyday is a new cultural adventure is like air in our lungs and blood in our veins". I know a lot of people that might say she is a bit crazy, or at the very least, that they could never feel the same way. After having lived overseas for several years, and traveling to many places at other times, these words do not sound crazy to me at all. Rather than crazy, they seem very true.
While moving from Redding , California to Spokane, Washington may not necessarily seem like a move to a more culturally diverse place, it has actually been quite interesting already. My job with the community colleges here allows me to frequently interact with ESL students who have moved to this area for various reasons. Maybe Spokane is not the most culturally diverse place, but my job is wonderful because it allows me to interact with what diversity there is around here - and that excites me.
Yesterday, I helped a Mexican, a Serbian, and a Rwandan set up email accounts so that they could email their ESL instructor. They were all asking similar questions in different versions of broken English. The task of trying to understand them each and communicate effectively with them may seem overwhelming to some, but it gave me a strange sense of happiness. It was also fun to know that just behind me, there were Russians, Moroccans, Burmese, Vietnamese, Ukrainian, and several other students working on their assignments at the computers.
The reality is that spending time overseas, especially living overseas, will ruin you. While I blend in here and I can understand almost everything around me, it doesn't quite feel "right". To many people, this is strange, and I admit that it must sound strange for me to say that I miss the days when I could hardly understand any of what was said around me, or why certain things were or were not happening, but it is true. I miss the experience of being enriched by the culture of others. So I guess that is why I am really appreciating the small bit of diversity and culture that I get to experience here. It is limited, but it is wonderful. I guess that is just one of the reasons to be thankful that the door was opened to pursue this new job.
I apologize if this was really random, but I know that there are a handful of people out there that will understand what I am trying to communicate. Since it has been random, I will say that I really want to learn another language someday. Ok, that's all for now.